


Forecast from Memory

by pocketmouse



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Community: who_minis, Episode: s05e08 The Hungry Earth, Gen, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-14
Updated: 2011-02-14
Packaged: 2017-10-15 15:49:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/162412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocketmouse/pseuds/pocketmouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They've got an appointment to meet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Forecast from Memory

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Settiai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Settiai/gifts).



Rory wasn't thinking about it, honestly. If anyone were to ask him why he'd asked for those specific days off in the middle of October, he wouldn't have been able to give them a solid answer. But when he woke up at the leisurely hour of 9 AM that Tuesday off, Amy was already up and about, throwing stuff into a duffle bag.

"Get up," she said. "My alarm didn't go off, we should've been up hours ago. Or we should've borrowed Sharon's car, it goes faster than 40 miles an hour."

Right. Cwmtaff. He sat up, swinging his legs out from under the covers. "We've got hours yet." He scratched the back of his head uneasily. He was going to die today. 20 kilometers under the Earth. He looked at his hand. Flesh. Not plastic.

"I'm not planning on missing this," Amy replied. "Now get up, or we'll be late." She walked past the bed, tossing some clothes at him, including the blue jacket he'd bought just last week.

"Love you too," he muttered, and she scruffled a hand through his hair as she walked past again.

"It's just Wales, Ames," he said as he clattered down the stairs. "What's the rush?"

"TARDIS shows up about one. It's going to take us almost three hours to get there."

"All right, all right." Still, he stopped to make some sandwiches and pull some cherries and a pear out of the fridge, put them all in a bag. Amy wouldn't want to stop for food once she was on the road.

She started the car the instant he closed the door. "Looks like it's gonna rain, d'you think so?" he asked.

"It's not going to rain," she said. Maybe not in Cwmtaff.

But the rain did seem to hold off, though the sky was a cloudy grey. They drove mainly through rural countryside, Amy pushing the accelerator down whenever there was no one else on the road — they were making good time. Rory studied his reflection in the side mirror. Ten years on, and neither one of them looked that much different than when they — well, he — had first met the Doctor. A couple more wrinkles, maybe a few extra pounds, but nothing spectacular. No ponytails or babies, no moving upmarket.

Which was fine, in a lot of ways. Five years ago had been tense — they both knew it had all been a dream, but that hadn't kept them both from turning their head at every creaking gate or whining car engine. Or going in tight circles around each other, wary of what the other might say, might be wishing for, regretting. But it had all been a dream, even if no one popped in to confirm it, and Rory was still a nurse, in short hair and scrubs, and Amy was still Amy, picking up whatever job suited her and telling stories to the children in the library and looking at the stars at night like she was waiting for something specific.

And sometimes Rory did too. Not as often, but he'd hear about someone's miraculous recovery at the hospital, and think ‘what if?' or he'd pick up the phone and no one would be on the other end, but he'd still check three times before hanging up. He found himself tracing trajectories to the ground whenever he saw a meteor shower.

But life went on. And ten years was nothing, right?

Rory looked up as Amy pulled them off the road and turned off the engine. "We here?" He looked around, but the trees next to the car blocked his view.

"Yeah. Well, the town's down the hill, but the road doubles back. If we walk for a little bit, we should end up right over the church."

"Is that what you've been doing on Google?" he asked, crawling after her out of the car. She'd parked maybe a little close to the trees.

"That and researching grass. D'you know how hard it is to find changes in _grass_? No one's that bored, not even in Wales." She took his hand, and they trooped over the hillside, trying to find the best vantage point of the small town.

"There's the church," Amy pointed. "I don't see the TARDIS." She checked her watch and frowned.

Rory peered over her shoulder, a little reluctant. "Something's odd."

"What do you mean?" Amy asked. "Church, grass, great big mining thing. All we're missing is the TARDIS." The area around the church remained empty. Then Rory realized what was missing.

"There's no grave."

"What grave?" Amy's voice was sharp.

"In the graveyard," he said stupidly. "Remember, you and the Doctor went ahead and when I went to catch up I ran into Ambrose and Elliot. They thought I was with the police." Amy's face looked tense. Neither of them liked talking about the time when Rory was... not just dead, and this was kind of treading the line. "Anyway, there should be an open grave," he finished, shrugging his shoulders a little.

"Maybe it's just not visible from here?" Amy offered.

Rory shook his head. "You can see the whole plot from here." With the patchwork grass, he couldn't tell if it just hadn't been dug up yet, or if the grass had already been replaced. "Are you sure we've got the date right?" he asked cautiously.

"This is what the Doctor said," Amy insisted.

Rory was about to argue when a big fat raindrop landed on his forehead. Then another, and another, and then the rain was pouring down in sheets, the clouds letting loose an absolute waterfall.

"No!" Amy shouted. "It's not supposed to rain today! This is all wrong!" She whirled around, looking like she was about to stomp down the hillside to the village and demand an answer from whoever might be around.

"Amy, let's get back in the car." Rory grabbed her arm, giving her a tug. He'd pulled his hood up, but Amy hadn't, and now her hair was plastered flat to her skull. She let him tug her back, but she refused to go any further, just taking his arms and wrapping them around herself. He shifted and sighed, tucking his head against her shoulder to angle out of the rain some, if Amy was going to insist they stay out here in it. "We're probably just early," he offered. "If they'd finished the drilling project, you'd've read about that, wouldn't you?"

Amy made a noncommittal, irritated noise. Hopefully she was irritated at the Doctor, not him. Rory definitely was. Which surprised him. He'd been nervous all morning, thinking about what was happening, and now that there was — nothing, he felt strangely disappointed. And annoyed. What had the Doctor been thinking? Probably he hadn't been, was the problem.

Then suddenly the rain wasn't falling on them. Rory could still hear it, pattering against something overhead.

"Sorry about that, didn't realize I'd got the date wrong ‘til I showed up looking for you and you weren't there." Amy and Rory both twisted around to stare at the Doctor, who was carrying a massive golf umbrella that now sheltered the three of them. He beamed at them. "Look at the two of you! All grown up."

"Doctor!" Amy hugged him tightly, which the Doctor returned, if one-handed due to the umbrella. Then she pulled back and smacked his chest. "I can't believe you got the date wrong. Some Time Lord you are."

"Well, it explains why it wasn't Rio, either," the Doctor replied glibly. He cast a look at Rory over Amy's shoulder, raising an eyebrow slightly. "Hello, Rory."

Rory knew what the look meant. He recognized it easily. But it didn't bother him any more. It wasn't teasing, just friendly. He gave the Doctor a quick hug. "Hello, Doctor." Now if nothing else the Doctor was nearly as wet at the two of them.

The Doctor seemed to realize what Rory had been doing. He returned Rory's hug as well, pulling them both in close, passing Amy the umbrella so he could put an arm around each of them. "You know, I think I've got some towels in the TARDIS. I seem to recall neither of you being too partial to staying wet."

"Ooh, Doctor, who could resist an invitation like that?" Amy said with a wink. She grinned at Rory as well, over the Doctor, and he couldn't help but grin back, something settling into place inside him.

   

It took Rory five minutes to change into dry clothes, and he moved back out to the console room to wait with the Doctor. Amy would probably be another twenty minutes. The Doctor was poking idly at a lever, pointedly not looking at him. Rory didn't care.

"So how long has it been for you, then, since we left?"

The Doctor shrugged. "Not too long."

Which meant nothing. "Not traveling with anyone else right now, though?" he asked instead.

The Doctor tapped harder.

Rory sighed and moved closer, unavoidably in the Doctor's line of sight. "Doctor, why'd you pick now to come visit us? And don't try and tell me you weren't looking for us."

"Of course I was," the Doctor said, looking up at last. "I just — I missed you, all right?" He turned away from Rory, crossing to the far side of the room. "My last companion left — angry. I didn't have a choice about what I did, but she didn't seem to understand that. And I realized —" the Doctor hesitated again. "I've made a lot of people unhappy over the years. But you two were one of the few happy endings." Amy came down the steps and stood by his shoulder, her face serious.

"You say that like we were over," Amy said.

The Doctor tilted his head. "No. But you know I don't usually keep in touch with my friends. I only ever see them at one point in their life. And happy is a good look for the two of you." He smiled, tentative.

Rory ducked his head. "You've made plenty of people happy over the years, I'm sure."

The Doctor chuckled. "Rory..."

"Rory's right, and you know it," Amy interrupted. "You just like to wallow. Well, none of that. This ship is officially a no-wallowing zone."

"You can't make rules about _my_ ship!" the Doctor retorted, though he seemed amused.

"Wanna bet?" Amy smirked. "Rory, what was that rule I had?"

"I'm not allowed to wear your tights because I always get runs in them?"

The Doctor made a choked noise, and Amy smacked Rory's arm. "No, the other one."

"The one where you promised not to flirt with anyone we met on the TARDIS unless they flirted first, and I promised to let you know if the Doctor suddenly declared that he only fancied men and came after my virtue?"

"Your _what?!_ " the Doctor spluttered. "I don't —"

"That's the one!" Amy crowed.

"It is kind of a silly rule," Rory said. He bit his lip, trying to keep from laughing at the colors the Doctor's face was turning.

Amy laughed. "True."

"I mean really, expecting Amy to wait for someone else to flirt first. That never worked."

"I — you —" The Doctor shook his head. "Did I say I missed you? I think I changed my mind." He pointed a finger at Rory. "And you! You used to stop her!"

"Uh, I stopped that about two weeks in. You really missed that?"

The Doctor tilted his head again. "...Maybe." He thought for a moment. "Really? I mean, what with the whole getting married thing, I thought..."

"For all the time you spend with humans, you're rubbish at figuring out when they're hitting on you, Doctor." Amy said with a sigh.

"You didn't figure that out somewhere around the part where he thought the bowtie was a good idea?" Rory asked. Feeling bold, he tugged at it.

The Doctor stared down at Rory's hand, then at Rory, then at Amy. "I have a strange feeling I'm not actually going to regret this," he said.

"Good," said Amy, using Rory's hand to tug the Doctor closer. "Because your timing's been bad enough already, we're not stopping now."


End file.
